


Rot

by Anonymous



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Character Study, Drabble Collection, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-06
Updated: 2014-04-06
Packaged: 2018-01-18 09:23:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1422952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>It wouldn't be accurate to say Javert's heart was made of stone.</i>
</p><p>  <i>He would have been offended if told so, in fact.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Rot

"Keep an eye out for-" the senior guard paused and pointed forward. "There. You know what to do."  
  
Javert raised his cudgel, then hesitated. He had seen this done countless times before, but seeing was different from doing. The shivering man doubling over seemed so helpless. Pitiable, even.  
  
He couldn't falter. Not on the very first step.  
  
He landed two swift strikes on the convict's back. The man gasped in pain, then bowed his head and scurried after his chain-mate.  
  
The senior guard nodded. "Not bad. Next time, strike faster. These animals need immediate retribution for their disobedience."  
  
"Yes, sir."  
  


* * *

  
“Please, Monsieur l'inspecteur,” the pitiful woman wailed, hands clasped, face drenched in tears.  “I have committed a crime, I admit it! But please, have mercy! I will never do it again! It was only for my children, my poor darling children. If you take me, who will look after them? Mercy!”  
  
“A theft is a theft. Now march, or do we have to drag you out?”  
  
Javert turned. Two children stood in the doorway; a boy and a girl, clad in rags, gaunt, their enormous eyes affixed in horror at their mother.  
  
Seeing their grief-stricken faces, Javert almost hesitated.  
  
Almost.

* * *

  
“Please! If I hadn't, he would have killed me! If only you had seen the look in his eyes! I beg of you, don't-”  
  
Javert looked on as the gendarmes escorted the crying woman stained in blood outside. Her protestations were swallowed up by the pitch black night. He looked quietly over the aftermatch of the struggle.  
  
Javert was pleased to notice he felt nothing. No pity, no remorse, not even real anger. Nothing but glowing satisfaction knowing he had done his part in maintaining order in the world.  
  
After the arrest, he treated himself to a pinch of snuff.  
  


* * *

  
The gendarme was young, barely older than Javert himself had been when he had first become a guard. Between hitched breaths, he sobbed out words made nigh incomprehensible by whimpers and alcohol.  
  
“I-I just...all I want is to help people...and all I get is a cold shoulder in turn...” the rest of the sentence drowned in tears.  
  
Javert sighed and folded his arms. He had no experience in comforting others, but he needed the gendarme to calm down and fast, drunk on duty or not.  
  
“Never mind them; you're doing the right thing. That's the best we can strive for.”  
  


* * *

  
It wouldn't be accurate to say Javert's heart was made of stone.  
  
He would have been offended if told so, in fact.  
  
A heart of stone was always insensate, whereas he had worked very hard to kill his emotions; to turn himself into a more effective tool for the government, he had done all he could to suffocate mercy and pity until it had become a second nature to him.  
  
He was very proud of the fact.  
  
A heart of wood,  he didn't mind. It pleased him a little, almost. Wood was alive once. The metaphor made his efforts apparent.  
  


* * *

  
What had Valjean done? And what had he, Javert, done in turn? What was he to do now, when all structure and order within him had collapsed?  
  
The abyss, previously an ever-present danger yet safely contained, now surrounded him at all sides, crushing him, suffocating him, with nothing to cling to for support. Wherever he looked, more questions abounded, and every answer his addled mind put forth terrified him to the core.  
  
In his mind's eye, he beheld in horror the tiny sapling sprouting forth from what he had thought was long since dead.  
  
Yet it couldn't thrive.  
  
Not alone.


End file.
